


With You

by griever11



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: 8x03, F/M, Family Feels, Father-Daughter Relationship, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Leap of Faith, One Shot, Protective Oliver, Smoak-Queen conversations, lil bit angsty, post-episode
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-01
Updated: 2019-11-01
Packaged: 2021-01-16 04:16:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21264926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/griever11/pseuds/griever11
Summary: Post 8x03 Leap of Faith.Oliver, William and Mia have a lot of feelings and in classic Queen fashion, have somewhat of a hard time expressing them. Oliver learns about the future and his kids try to make sense of the past.





	With You

During the entire course of Felicity’s third trimester, a period of time that Oliver experienced with equal parts of joy, nervousness and excitement, Felicity had repeated over and over that their baby daughter, based on her penchant for keeping her mother up all night somersaulting in her belly, was going to turn out_ exactly _like him.

“Mia might have Smoak blood in her, but God, all_ this _ is 100% you,” Felicity groaned one night as they lazed around in bed, watching the little lump that was either a foot or a fist traverse the entirety of Felicity’s bump. 

He remembers that night with startling clarity, as he does now with_ all _ his memories of her (they also come with the sharp sting of loss and everything associated with _ leaving _ her, but he ignores that for now), recalling the way she poked at their restless baby, chasing the alien-like movement across her body. 

“She’s not due for another two weeks and already itching to get out of me. All you, mister. Hmph.” 

“You know, if I had my say, I’d_ never _ get out of you,” he had replied with a salacious smirk, eliciting a scandalised gasp from his wife which then lead to, as did most of their nights back in those days, some really creative, flexible sexy times.

The ache in his heart burns right through him now as the images of a much simpler, happier, life plays in his mind’s eye. The sinking, gut-wrenching, shattering, pain of heartbreak as a result of having to leave his family behind hasn’t faded one bit since the day the Monitor whisked him away and tonight - _ tonight, _ it got worse. 

Because mere hours ago, he was confronted with the future he was supposed to be saving, in the form of an adult Mia, an even more adult William, and a third young man who’s still a stranger to him, something that still hasn’t quite sunk in yet. 

Oliver might have made his peace with traveling across universes and conversing with goddamned cosmic-beings, but seeing his children tonight? Bathed in the bright glow of _ whatever, _ Mia bleeding from her neck, with not quite dry tear-tracks down her face, a face that looks exactly like Felicitys, and William, who looked as shell-shocked as Oliver felt _ \- _

No amount of world-hopping or cosmic-being led missions could have ever prepared him for _ that. _

Mia’s choked and anguished, “Dad?” rang in his ear on a loop, overlaying his memories of her as a baby, with her chubby cheeks, bright blue eyes and her grumpy ‘I’m hungry’ face. The disbelief in that one syllable had mirrored the confusion and shock churning in his stomach, but before he could make any sense of what had just happened, chaos erupted. 

Dinah and Rene had clamored after them, advancing towards new arrivals, talking over each other, demanding answers and explanations, with no care in the world that three out of the four visitors were obviously from_ another time _ so Oliver doesn’t blame Mia one bit for being overwhelmed by the attention.

His whispered, “Mia?” had fallen on deaf ears, lost among the confusion. She had stared at him with a heaviness in her gaze that shouldn't exist yet, not for someone so young, and he was struck by her uncanny resemblance to Felicity, only with longer, curlier, hair, and more hardened exterior, but relation is nonetheless undeniable. 

“I need some air,” she’d grunted, wiping the grime from her face furiously, ignoring every question being hurled at her, and then running out of the bunker straight after. 

William - he hadn’t introduced himself, but Oliver _knows,_ right in his bones, that he’s his son - had winced at Mia’s sudden departure, still not quite recovered from whatever just happened himself, and then quietly told Oliver, “I’ll take her back to the apartment when she’s calmed down. She’s a little hot-headed, impulsive, but she’ll come around.” 

So, turns out Felicity was right all those months ago, she’s _100% _ his daughter.

Which is how Oliver ends up lying in his old bed in the loft Felicity had set up for them while he was in prison, waiting for when William eventually brings Mia back to the apartment like he said he would. 

Fortunately for them, Felicity had had the foresight to hold on to their apartment in the city even after they packed up and moved to Bloomfield; “Just in case,” she’d told him, because she’s a genius, and amazing and wonderful and -

God, he misses her _ so much. _

“- stop it, William, let go -” 

“Can you just hold on? We don’t know what kind of security Mom -” 

“If we’re really in 2019, right now, Mom’s in_ Bloomfield.” _

Oliver jerks out of bed at the sound of voices entering the apartment. He all but rolls off the mattress, up on his feet just as he hears the front door shut close. 

“Besides, why would the alarm be on if he knows we’re coming?” Mia’s voice floats through the apartment again, sounding more than a little grumpy. “That would be stupid.” 

William sighs. “I think you underestimate our dad’s protective streak.” 

“I think I don’t know anything about our dad.” 

Oliver freezes, his blood turning to ice. The bitterness in Mia’s voice has him in a chokehold, nailing him to the spot by the bedroom door. Invisible hands squeeze his heart as the implication sinks in. 

She doesn’t know him. 

Which means he doesn’t return to his family in her timeline. 

His heart shatters into a million little pieces. His knees almost buckle.

“That’s not fair, Mia,” William responds, and from the tone of his voice, it’s definitely not the first time they’ve had this conversation. “You _ do _ know him. Everything Mom told you about him is -”

“True. Yeah, yeah, I know. _ Whatever. _ Are you sure we’re at the right place? Doesn’t look like anyone’s here.”

The question jolts him out of his trance-like state, and Oliver hurries out into the hallway. He doesn’t make any effort to silence his footsteps, and when he emerges in the living room, he’s once more confronted by the sight of his two children.

He almost can’t believe it. 

His children. 

His_ adult _children. Exhausted, dirty, injured, adult children, one of them wearing what looks like his Green Arrow quiver. 

The confusion and the questions only keep piling up.

They’re both sitting at the kitchen counter, where he, Felicity, and William used to have their meals, and okay, also where that one time they were paralysed by toxic gas piped through the ventilation - but _ still. _

Oliver has to reach out and steady himself against the wall because the sight before him _ hurts. _Cuts into him so deeply that whatever he had planned on saying to them vanishes from his mind. He zeroes in on Mia’s nasty looking cut along her neck, the bruises that are purpling along her cheekbones, the bloodied fists that she has balled up on the counter as she glares stubbornly at him. 

“Dad.” 

It’s William who breaks the silence, and then the young man pushes away from the counter and walks up to him confidently, engulfing him in a tight hug. “Dad, _ hey,” _he repeats breathlessly. “You’re here.” 

Oliver’s transported back to the last time William was here; the quiet, sullen kid who had insisted on moving to go live with his grandparents, and he tightens his hold on him. Breathes him in.

His son. He has his son back. 

_ “William.” _

“So you _ do _remember me, ha,” his son quips with a lopsided grin as he pulls away, though he stays close allowing Oliver to take a moment to marvel at how much he’s grown. 

William had been a tall kid the last time he saw him, lanky and a little gawky - Felicity had been frustrated at how quickly he overtook her height wise - but this man before him now has clearly filled out over the years. He’s strapping and handsome and suave and - 

“Though I suppose we’re back in 2019, so it’s only been what, less than a year since I moved back to Central City? Peanuts compared to twenty years of no contact with you guys, right? Hey, that means Mia’s technically like, an itty-bitty baby right now.” 

And apparently he’s also picked up on Felicity’s penchant for babbling - wait. 

_ Hang on. _

What - 

“Twenty years?” Oliver blurts out, finally registering what William said. “What -”

“Might want to sit down for this, Dad, kind of a long story,” Mia speaks, _ finally, _directly at him. 

She rolls her neck and Oliver winces when a fresh trickle of blood trails down her already marred skin. He can only look on in horror as his daughter wipes at it so casually, so flippantly, with the back of her hand like she’s done this a million times - _ wiped at her own blood _ \- before she straightens and resumes staring at him. 

_ Fuck. _

  


The chill returns in full force, dread coursing through his veins. The question that’s plagued him for weeks - _ is this all worth it _ \- rears its ugly head again. 

Not only does Mia not know _ him, _ but William’s just implied he’s had zero contact with Felicity in _ twenty years. _Add to the fact that his daughter is obviously injured, but sitting right there in front of him, not even flinching at a neck wound so deep it’s still bleeding hours after. 

What - what kind of future have they come from? 

His fingers twitch by his side, debating internally about what he should do next. What’s the protocol here? How do you greet your angry adult daughter, who technically was only a little baby mere weeks ago, who also looks so closed off that even Oliver, known king of being closed off, doesn't know what to do? 

“Can I -” he gulps. His throat closes up, tears pricking the corners of his eyes. His voice cracks as he gives in to his desperation. “Mia... can I hug you?” 

The request ends up being the only thing Oliver needs to send the girl’s walls crumbling, and in the next second, she’s flying into his arms in a whirlwind of blonde curls, long limbs, dirt, blood and sweat and Oliver never, ever, wants to let go. Oliver closes his eyes, inhaling her scent. Threads her loose curls through his fingers the same way he’s done with Felicity’s hair so many, many times before. 

She’s small. Slender. Muscle and bone and strength and he doesn’t know her at all, but whatever it was that brought her to him, whatever crazy, ridiculous turn of events had to occur to have them meet this way, he knows in the deepest part of his soul, that he’s proud of her. 

Mia half-sobs into his neck as if she can read his mind. Her fingers clutch the back of his shirt, twisting the material as she holds on to him. 

“I can’t believe it’s really you.” 

* * *

Mia asks for whiskey. 

William asks for wine. 

Oliver just wants to sit down for a minute. 

And he does. He pulls up a barstool and sinks into it, downing his own glass of whiskey. 

They don’t start at the beginning like Oliver wants them to, but right at the end, only giving him what he suspects is a very, very Cliff’s Notes version of what transpired just before they ended up at the bunker, but even _ that’s _ already enough to floor him. 

A fallen Star City? Multiple Deathstrokes? Rene’s daughter killed? The other man who was with them when they arrived was Connor Hawke, Diggle’s adopted son? 

“I don’t think we should tell you anymore,” William says haltingly. “Time traveling rules, you know?” 

“What do _ you _ know about time traveling rules?” Mia snipes at her brother, folding her arms over her chest. “You might be a genius, but don’t pretend like you’ve ever done this before.”

“I lived in Central City, Mia, we’re all practically experts on time travel,” William scowls. “Home of the Flash?” 

When Mia doesn’t react, William rolls his eyes. “The guy who messed up timelines every second Tuesday because he felt like it? Come on, you must know who the Flash is.”

Oliver feels a smile spreading over his lips. The snark reminds him so much of his and Thea’s relationship and a pang of regret slices through him at the thought. She should have come back with him instead of staying in Nanda Parbat. She would have loved this. 

“Well, the Flash disappeared when I was five. Who cares about_ him?” _

And_ that _catches his attention. 

“Barry dies?” Oliver asks. He leans forward, sips on his own glass of whiskey, contemplative. “In 2024? That doesn’t make sense. The crisis is happening... soon.”

William shoots Mia a withering look. “See what you just did?” 

“He doesn’t die, he_ disappears,” _ Mia corrects, shrugging off William's whine of protest. “Along with a whole bunch of other supers. And then Mom -” Mia falters, and then her mouth snaps shut, the same exact way Felicity’s does when she thinks she’s said too much. Her cheeks turn pink. 

“Oh, _ now _you decide Dad doesn’t need to know,” William mutters. 

Alarm bells go off in Oliver’s head. Bright red, loud, klaxon type alarms. What happens to her? What happens to Felicity?

She's never far from his mind, ever, but he hadn’t yet been able to find a way to bring her up with his kids. Why wasn’t she with them? What’s she been doing? He nearly asked them before, but had kept his mouth shut, thinking that it was best to let them tell their story in their own time. 

And besides that, he didn’t think he wanted to know. Twenty years is a really long time and he’s figured out, or at least suspects that he’s been gone for most of it. So if Felicity... if Felicity had _ moved on _without him, he didn’t want to know. He only wants her to be happy. That’s all he ever wanted. 

But Mia’s crestfallen expression at the mention of her mother is _ telling _ and a gnawing pit opens up in his stomach and now he wants to know. He can almost taste the bile in his throat. What if - 

_ What if - _

He can’t even bring himself to think about it.

“Mom does the same thing too.” 

Oliver’s pulled out of his worst-case scenario thoughts by Mia’s quiet proclamation. He looks down at his fingers where Mia’s tipped her chin to. 

“She twists her wedding ring when she thinks about you.” 

Oliver hadn’t even realised he was doing it, but it’s always felt natural to have the slim metal ring between his fingers. It’s his only physical connection to the love of his life. A reminder of their promise of forever to each other. He hasn’t been gone that long, and he’s already feeling the deep-seated, bitter emptiness in his heart at her absence from his life. 

“She thinks about you a lot.” 

Oliver picks up on the present tense. Mia’s talking in present tense. That's good. And the tightness in chest eases up a little. It doesn't answer the nagging question of why she isn't with them, but present tense is better than... the alternative.

“She...” Oliver swallows the lump in his throat, relief on the tip of his tongue. “Felicity still has her ring?” 

A shadow of a smile flickers over Mia’s face and Oliver’s once more arrested by how much she looks like Felicity. A tentative bud of warmth and love blossoms in his world-weary, trampled, heart at the smile, knowing that Mia’s not just all scowls and frowns. 

“I’ve never seen her without it,” Mia responds, blissfully unaware of the roller-coaster of emotions in Oliver. “Not once. Not even when she went with -” 

“Mia,” William cuts in, deep lines forming on his forehead. “Don’t say anymore -”

“What’s the point of us being here, if we can’t tell him -”

“I don’t know, but I don’t want to risk our timeline more than we already have, Mia! I’ve seen what messing with the future can do and -” 

“Who_ cares _about our future, William?!” Mia yells, scrambling off the barstool. She slips the quiver full of arrows off her shoulder and slams it onto the counter, getting right in William’s face.

“Our future _ sucks! _ I grow up without a dad, _ you _ grow up without your parents and don’t even know I exist, mom turns into a paranoid recluse, Zoe’s dead, Connor and JJ want to kill each other, _ why _would you want to go back to that, William? Don’t you want to try and fix it instead? Don’t you think we deserve better than - better than all of that?”

When she’s done, her chest is heaving, tears are streaming down her face and she’s wild-eyed and gasping for air like she’s been keeping all of that simmering on the inside for far too long. 

His son doesn’t back down, not at all intimidated by his sister. William runs his hand through his hair, frustrated, and when he doesn’t raise his voice to her, a surge of fatherly pride travels through Oliver. 

“You don’t know what time travel does, Mia, I do. And nothing good comes from it. The Flash had _ his _kid -”

_ “I don’t care about the Flash!!” _

Oliver’s first thought is a smug, _ ‘Yeah, that’s my girl,’ _followed quickly by the more sobering realisation that Mia’s inherited her mother’s Loud Voice, and isn’t afraid to use it either. Her anger echoes through the empty apartment, and the tension between the siblings ratchets up another notch as they continue bickering. 

The short and fleeting moment of elation at having his kids with him vanishes instantly as phrases like_ ‘Mom said I had to protect you’,’ and ‘Star City is a war zone’, _ and _ ‘we’re all being hunted’ _ start being thrown around as they argue with each other.

They pay no heed to him as they land metaphorical blow after blow against his psyche, giving him glimpses of a future that’s bleak and desolate and hopeless and Oliver thinks that he might be on the verge of a panic attack. He can’t feel his face, or his fingers, or his toes, and there’s a strange ringing in his ear that drowns out whatever William’s response to Mia’s outburst is. 

William didn’t know Mia existed? Felicity’s a paranoid recluse? 

_ That is their future? _

“Hey, _ stop,” _ Oliver pleads. He’s getting a migraine, he’s exhausted, and it’s just... too much. Too much all at once. Hell, six hours ago he was still in Nanda Parbat. He hasn’t slept, he hasn’t eaten and - 

And Mia should be in her crib in Bloomfield, sleeping right now, not standing in front of him picking a fight with her brother, who should be in Central City, safely tucked away from any of this madness. 

“Stop fighting, please.” 

And they do stop. Mia steps away from her brother, and when she looks at Oliver, it’s with a little contrition and the apology falls from her lips immediately. “Sorry, Dad.” 

“You got her to say sorry, wow,” William mutters behind her. “Took me like, months to get even a ‘My bad’ from her. Consider yourself lucky.” 

Oliver recognises William’s flippant attitude as a coping mechanism, he sees right through the self-deprecating humour he wields as a shield against the fear and uncertainty that Oliver detects in his body language. 

Felicity does the same thing. The ever present ache in his chest travels all the way to his fingertips like an uncontrollable cancer. 

“I’m a little overwhelmed,” Oliver admits, placing his hands palms down on the counter, leaning forward with his head bowed. He has so many questions, and some he doesn’t even know if he wants the answers to. “I - I don’t know what to do, or why you’re here...”

“Well, I know why _you're_ here. You’re on a mission, obviously. That’s why you left us.” Mia delivers the statement so matter-of-factly and Oliver snaps his head up to look at her. “You’re a hero, that’s what heroes do.” 

And then, with so much conviction, with determination etched into the hard set of her jaw, and her brow furrowed the same way he remembers her doing as a baby rooting for milk, she says:

“I want to help.” 

“Mia... it’s not safe.” 

“No, we’re not negotiating this.” She picks up her quiver, shouldering it as she rounds the corner. Oliver doesn’t miss the way she elbows William out of the way to stand in front of him. She’s short - a little shorter than Felicity, but blazing with the same Smoak brand of fire that he loves so much.

“I already spent my entire life without you. If you think I’m letting you do whatever you’re doing alone, then you’re mistaken. I want to do this with you. I want to be out here with you. Not safe.” 

Oh _ hell. _

Oliver nearly collapses at her words. 

“So now, I’m going to go sleep in William’s room and tomorrow, we’re going to really catch up and you’re going to tell me whatever the hell it is you’re up to that is more important than watching me grow up.”

His mouth falls open, helpless to the feisty woman who is his daughter, and before he can say anything, she’s pulled him into another hug. 

“That being said, I do love you, Dad,” she whispers into his ear, and okay yep, he definitely leans on her more than he should at her declaration, afraid that he’s going to just keel over in shock.

“Mia...” he gasps. But he can’t find the words. There aren’t any in the world that can adequately describe the rush of emotions burning a path through his body. 

“I love you so much. I’ve loved you every day of my life. And I miss you and if you tell William, I’ll deny everything.” 

And with that, she ducks out from under his embrace and disappears into the hallway that leads to what used to be William’s room. 

“She’s 50% you and 50% mom, which means she’s 100% stubborn,” William muses, watching his sister’s retreating back. He tips his wine glass back and empties it. “You’re not going to be able to change her mind.”

“I gave up trying to change a Smoak’s mind a long time ago.” Oliver blows out a lengthy breath of air, pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers. William doesn’t make a move to retire for the night like Mia did, happy to stand by the kitchen counter and it makes Oliver brave.

“How - how have you been?” he ventures, knowing that there’s a very high chance he’s not going to like the answer. 

It’s strange, conversing with him, this version of him anyway. So... mature and charming and maybe sending him to Central City _ was _ good for him after all. Not that a city full of psychopathic meta-humans is any less dangerous, but if it means William turns out like this? This confident, smart, handsome, young man? Maybe he hasn’t completely screwed up all his children’s lives after all. 

“I hated you for a long time.”

Oliver’s eyes flutter shut, shrinking inwardly, stomach dropping like lead. “Will-” 

“When you didn’t call like you promised you would -”

Oliver starts to protest at that, but William holds his hand up to stop him. 

“Until I found out that it was my grandparents who cut off all contact with you. I think it was around when I got accepted to college that I found the voice messages you guys left me. But by then it was too late.” 

William swallows hard, and his veneer of calm and collectedness falls for a second. “I found out you were dead and that Felicity had gone into hiding. I wanted to reach out, to look for her, but then I thought - I thought, what if she doesn’t want to see me? You know? You were dead, she had no claim to me, and what if she thought that it was_ my _ choice to stop all contact? So I just... I watched her from afar.” 

“You watched her?” Oliver presses, hoping that William disregards his own warning about revealing too much about the future and tells him more. He’s hungry, starving, and desperate for any tidbit about his wife, and since his children are adamant on not telling him where she is in their time, he’ll take anything he can get.

“Kind of. I watched her company. Smoak Tech is... amazing, Dad. I kept up with her company, even though no one, and I mean _ no one, _knew anything about the elusive CEO and founder of the company. But I knew. There were - well, it’s not important, but I knew it was her. My ex used to say I had a weird hero-worship complex with her, and he wasn’t wrong... I just missed her that’s all. A lot. So much of who I am today is because of her.” 

The tears fall freely down Oliver’s face and he doesn’t bother wiping them away. He can’t. His family, torn apart by force of circumstance, through no fault of their own, somehow, miraculously, still seem so solid. 

It shakes him to his core. 

“But Mia’s right. Our future does kinda suck. So you know, if your grand plan is to fix it, then I’m in. All in. Can’t get any worse than it is right now anyway. Just don’t tell her I said she’s right though.”

Oliver lets out a quiet half-laugh, half-sniffle, because God, the two of them may only share his blood, but they truly are the perfect embodiment of siblings. 

“William, I... don’t know what to -” Oliver shakes his head. Drags his hand down his face, collecting the tears of hurt and regret and pain in its path. 

“It’s okay, Dad. It’s okay.” 

And then he finds himself curling his arms around William, cheek to cheek with his son, sagging into yet another emotionally-laden hug. 

“I love you,” he grunts, tightening his hold on him. It’s the only thing he knows to be true. No matter what timeline he’s in, no matter what Earth he’s supposed to be saving, that fact will always remain unchanged. “I love you, all of you so, so much.”

William nods, and then pulls back just a little. “You know the question you’re dying to ask but haven’t yet?”

Intuitive as ever, his son. 

Oliver clenches his jaw, steels himself for the inevitable. He can take it. Whatever it is that William’s about to tell him, he’ll weather it with a brave face. His heart thuds erratically beneath his chest.

“Yeah...”

William grins, a little melancholy, but it’s the same lopsided grin twelve year old William had given him when he found out Felicity and him were dating, and it imbues Oliver with a small sense of relief. 

“Mom found you. In our future. And she... I don’t know, somehow, made the Monitor take her to you.” William lets out a bark of laughter, like he still doesn’t believe it himself. “Trust Mom to be able to wrap some weird cosmic-being around her fingers, huh?” 

What is he - what is William saying right now? Oliver blinks at his son dumbly. Felicity, his amazing, genius wife, made the Monitor - 

“Dad, she’s not with us now, because she’s with _ you.” _

And with that - hearing the confirmation from his son’s lips, armed the knowledge that even if he does change the future somehow, that in her timeline, in _ Felicity’s _ world, she does end up finding him eventually, fulfilling her promise to him - a huge weight lifts from Oliver’s shoulders, and it’s -

It’s _ freeing. _

**Author's Note:**

> Snuck this in before NaNo! I had feelings and I had to share them. Feel free to share yours with me too :) Comments and kudos always welcome.
> 
> Twitter: @griever_11
> 
> Huge thanks to the clown club for the last minute beta love you lots :)


End file.
